Go-Live With Navision the book - Introduction

I need to do some editing.

Churchill once said, "I am going to give a long speech as I have not had time to write a short one." I feel like that at the moment, and I need to spend more time shortening the text. Bear with me please :-).

Is this book for me?

The current release will target two people. The first is the project manager that has just been given the task of Implementing Navision in their company as an end user, and secondly a developer recently new to Navision that is going to do some of the development of this implementation. Of course the book will be of use to many more people than just those, but I want to focus at the moment on one set of objectives. In fact those two roles are often filled by a Navision Independent Consultant, so this book will be aimed very much at Independent Consultants. An important note is that whilst the book is aimed at developers, (n the current release at least) this book is NOT a programming guide to Navision, the Navision C/SIDE guides are fine to learn how to code, this book will teach you how to use your programming skills to develop solutions. Once completed in its next phase, the book can be used as a guide for creating a NSC.

My Background

I have worked in most areas of Navision since 1990, and at last count have taken a major role (Project Manager, Lead Developer, or System Architect) in 187 Navision Implementations. My introduction to Navision was to implement as an end user, this implementation was in the Czech Republic, and my role was to find a system, translate it to Czech, localize it to local laws, customize, train users and convert historical data. Cutting the story short (more about this though the book), the project was a great success, so the company decided to become a Navision NSC, we sold 6 systems which were very successful, and I moved to create thee Navision NTR for the Czech Republic. That went extremely well, so we expanded the company to be the Eastern European Distributor for Navision, with the objective of working with Navision to open NTR in each country, train them, then move out. During this time, I translated Navision into Czech, Russian, Hungarian, Latvian, Slovak and Polish. I then decided that I needed to get back to running my own company again, and became an freelance consultant and NISH. At this point I developed a Navision Add-On StockManager. Whilst it was selling well, the real business was free lance consulting, so that is what I concentrated on. In 1995 it became obvious that Navision were going to make big in roads into windows, and whilst most NSCs were planning to support both DOS and Windows concurrently, I mad the decision to stop freelancing on the DOS product, and concentrate 100% On Navision Financials Since there were so many new companies coming into Navision wanting to sell Financials, without any Navision background, business went well, and it was clearly the right decision. Then in 1998 Navision decided that they needed to concentrate on big NSCs and big sales, a part of this was to try to eliminate all independents, and smaller NSCs. They now wanted companies only with 20 or more employees of which at least 4 must be NCR certified. At that point I had 12 employees, 9 of which were Navision NCRs, which meant we had more than double the technical staff required, but not enough admin staff to be considered a Navision Partner. To me it seemed clear that this could only be a short term decision, but if I wanted to stay in Navision, I needed to join up with a Large partner. At that time I joined a large NSC as Business Development Manager, and partner to build up national and multi-national accounts. Here I was able to work at a different level, and make major turnarounds in team productivity. I did this again at another major NSC, and once I saw that Navision was again opening itself up to independent consultants, went back out to Freelance.

In short, I have basically worked as just about every type of partner that Navision have had, from being an end user, through to working for Navision it self. I have Taken a major role in 187 Navision implementations in 15 countries in 8 languages, from single user to 100+ users, on all versions of Navision from DOS 3.04 thru Navision 3.70 (still haven't go anyone live on 4.00). I believe this gives me the experience to be able to write this book, and hopefully help your implementation to be a success.

Credits

By the way, a special word of thanks to Erik Ernst and NOLUG (aka. MBSOnline). Erik has created the most comprehensive online reference for Navision and its user base, and as a Freelancer, it has been a most valuable source of business for me though the years.

.